


Gold in the Light

by ladygray99



Category: Forever Knight
Genre: Backstory, Character Study, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-16
Updated: 2017-12-16
Packaged: 2019-02-15 10:29:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,049
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13029138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladygray99/pseuds/ladygray99
Summary: Urs was a creature of the night long before she was brought across.





	Gold in the Light

**Author's Note:**

  * For [androcksandthings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/androcksandthings/gifts).



Urs had been a creature of the night long before she met Javier. When she was small her mother had told her her hair looked its best in candlelight, the sun washing away the gold of it. When she grew older she found her place singing for the men who inhabited the night. She used her voice to keep them happy, and happily they drank and gambled until the sun chased them into the stable or the beds of working girls. 

“Which one do you want?” Javier whispered in her ear.

She looked across the mob of men stumbling from the saloon to the brothel only one appetite slated for the night. “That one.”

“Ya like ‘em pretty.” Screed was on her other side more interested in his wine bottle than her hunting.

Urs knew the man. She had sung for him. He had sung with her a few times. He had golden hair, much like hers. The face of an angel and a voice to match. The working girls told stories about him far from his angelic form. She took a breath as the wind shifted and she could smell him. Smell his cologne, the brandy, the sent of some poor girl probably from the night before, and blood. She could smell his blood and hear his heart. 

She is stronger now. Not just stronger than what she was but stronger than any man. She hears his bones crack under her grip and she does not care.

She drinks her fill and keeps going, Javier pulling her away before she gluts herself. She doesn’t care, she laughs, filled with bliss. She feels alive, possibly for the first time.

They dump the body in a ditch on the edge of the city, stripped of its billfold and fine gold watch. Bourbon shows her how to run a blade over the marks she left on the throat so if anyone cared enough to ask questions the answer would be robbery.

There are fields and she runs across them each step strong and sure. She runs right to the edge of the wilderness shrieking with delight and joy. She can feel the others running at her side. They run with her and laugh with the joy of having no cares. When they finally stop, deep in the forest Bourbon tilts back his head and howls like a wild thing before dissolving into laughter. They all howl and laugh and howl some more.

They are miles from the brightest lights of the city but still she can see by just the few dots of starlight to come through the trees. Despite their ruckus she watches an owl drop from a high branch and glide on silent wings to the ground where there is a squeak and a crunch like the dead man’s bones.

They play tag through the trees like children. Javier cursing in Spanish and Bourbon in French and Screed like the sailor he is.

“Sun will be up soon,” Javier finally says calling a halt to their games. “We should head back, unless you want to sleep under the leaves today.”

She follows them back to the rooms they had rented but lingers awake letting a few rays of sun nip at her fingertips before pulling the curtains tight.

The next night they hunt and gamble. She sits at the table and gambles with the gold watch, instead of simply standing at another man’s shoulder. Screed wins that night but it doesn’t seem to matter. Javier promises to steal her the prettiest new dress they can find.

~

“Wake up.”

Her hand whipped out from under the unneeded but still comforting blanket and knocked Screed across the room.

“Easy there, luv. Still don’t know your own strength, do ya?”

“Where’s Javier?” she asked, only feeling slightly guilty for having struck Screed. None of them liked to be jolted awake. 

“He’s done a runner.”

“No.” She froze in fear. “He can’t. He can’t leave me.” Her voice rose to a shriek. Javier couldn’t leave her, not like her father left. Not like the parade of men after him.

“Easy, luv. We’ll catch up with him. He had to run and so do we. The Inca’s in town.”

“Who?”

Screed grinned. “Left out a few of the more sordid details our Spaniard did. Well, I’ll fill you in, after we get the fuck out of here. 

They catch up Javier a week later. The relief is heady for Urs and she throws her arms around him.

“Neither of you are ever this happy to see me.”

“She likes you better, mate.” 

They hunt that night, as a family, Javier says. Even Screed takes a drink from the man they kill but he complains about the taste. And they continue. Sometimes it’s a month before the Inca finds them again. Sometimes it’s years.

They hunt, and drink, and gamble. Urs finds she misses singing. The years roll on. The songs change, as do the fashions. She gleefully throws away her corset and refuses to buy another one when Dior puts out the “New Look”. She’d just spent a decade in trousers. 

Her hair does not glow under electric lights the way it did under flame but the men she sings for do not care. Their eyes don’t change. The way they look at her is no different from the night she died. There are days she is lonely. She sits awake and runs her fingertips through tiny shafts of sunlight. She thinks about finding someone of her own and bringing them across. She loves Javier but he doesn’t understand. He never did. Just like the men she sang for he saw something he wanted, but unlike the others he had the ability to take it.

Tracy’s hair is gold even under electric lights. She’s a modern women, never squeezed into a corset. Urs wonders if Javier will bring her across. There hasn’t been anyone new since her. Even after he and Bourbon got into that massive fight and Bourbon flew off swearing never to speak to them again, there was no one new. She saw the way his eyes lingered on Tracy, recognized the glances. Maybe he was finally learning. Maybe he was just biding his time. Time was, after all, something they had.


End file.
